Ala. Legislature votes to pardon Scottsboro Boys

This photograph taken Feb. 10, 2010, in Scottsboro, Ala., shows the Jackson County (Ala.) Sentinel from April 2, 1931, when nine young black men called ``the Scottsboro Boys'' were arrested on charges of raping two white women. The charges were later revealed as a sham, and the case gained notice worldwide. A new museum documenting the case has opened in Scottsboro. (AP Photo/Jay Reeves)

April 5, 2013 12:53:29 AM PDT

MONTGOMERY, Ala. --

In a final chapter to one of the most important civil rights episodes in American history, Alabama lawmakers voted Thursday to give posthumous pardons to the "Scottsboro Boys": nine black teens who were wrongly convicted of raping two white women more than 80 years ago.

The bill setting up a procedure to pardon the group must be signed by Gov. Robert Bentley to become law. He plans to study the legislation but has said he favors the pardons.

All but the youngest member of the group, whose ages ranged from 13 to 19, were sent to death row after false accusations from the women and convictions by all-white juries. All were eventually freed without executions. The case became synonymous with racial injustice and set important legal precedents, including a Supreme Court decision that outlawed the practice of excluding black people from juries.

The last of the men died in 1989.

The House approved the legislation Thursday morning in a 103-0 vote. The measure earlier passed the Senate 29-0.

"This is a great for Alabama. It was long overdue," said Democratic Rep. Laura Hall of Huntsville, who sponsored the bill in the House.

Democratic Rep. John Robinson of Scottsboro said the pardons "should have happened a long time ago."

The nine teens from Georgia and Tennessee were accused of raping two white women on a freight train in north Alabama in 1931. At this time during the Great Depression, many people would sneak aboard for free rides between cities. There had been a fight between whites and blacks on the train, and the two women made the false rape accusations in hopes of avoiding arrest.

The defendants were convicted in trials where, as typical in such cases at that time, guilty verdicts were never in doubt. The Communist Party seized on the case as an opportunity to make inroads among black people and liberals, and its legal arm was named as their attorneys. There were years of appeals - some successful, as one of the women recanted and said their claim was a lie. All the men were eventually freed.

The case set important legal precedents, including Supreme Court rulings that guaranteed the right to effective counsel and barred the practice of keeping blacks off juror rolls.

It's also retained cultural resonance decades later. A Broadway musical entitled "The Scottsboro Boys" was staged in 2010, the same year a museum dedicated to the case opened in Scottsboro.

After Thursday's vote, House Speaker Mike Hubbard, a Republican, said, "You can't change history, but you can take steps to right the wrongs of the past. The fact that this passed unanimously shows that today's 21st century Alabama is far removed from the one that caused such pain for so many so long ago."

The Senate sponsor, Republican Sen. Arthur Orr of Decatur said unfortunately the pardons come too late to help any of the Scottsboro Boys.

But he said the legislation does let the state write a "better final chapter of the tragic story of the Scottsboro Boys. Their lives were ruined by the convictions. By doing this, it sends a very positive message nationally and internationally that this is a different state than we were many years ago."

Orr credits Sheila Washington, founder of the Scottboro Boys Museum, for pursuing the legislation after the governor and parole board said they didn't have the legal authority to issue pardons to the deceased.

Washington, in a phone interview from the museum in Scottsboro, said the pardons would finally shine a light on "this dark injustice."

"I didn't sleep at all last night. I was nervous and teary eyed," she said.